Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger issues an executive order requiring recipients to promise they will use cash benefits only to meet basic subsistence needs. GOP legislators call for the cash to be returned.

By Jack Dolan, Los Angeles Times

June 25, 2010

California welfare recipients using state-issued debit cards withdrew more than $1.8 million in taxpayer cash on casino floors between October 2009 and last month, state officials said Thursday.

Gov. Arnold Schwarzenegger issued an executive order requiring welfare recipients to promise they will use cash benefits only to “meet the basic subsistence needs” of their families. The order also gave the state Department of Social Services seven days to produce a plan to reduce other types of “waste, fraud and abuse” in the welfare program.

Rancho Cucamonga Councilman Rex Gutierrez defrauded San Bernardino County taxpayers as part of a “culture of corruption” at the assessor’s office, a prosecutor charged Thursday in his closing argument.

Deputy District Attorney John Goritz told the jury there was overwhelming evidence of a conspiracy that allowed Gutierrez to get his position as intergovernmental relations officer at the assessor’s office through a political favor yet avoid any discipline for failing to do much work.

Rancho Cucamonga Councilman Rex Gutierrez knowingly falsified time records and was paid for hours not worked in the county Assessor’s Office, and should therefore be convicted of grand theft, a prosecutor said Thursday in San Bernardino Superior Court.

“The evidence shows, well beyond a reasonable doubt, that the defendant lied on his time cards and didn’t show up for work regularly,” prosecutor John Goritz said during his closing argument Thursday in Gutierrez’s trial. “You can decide this case based on that alone.”

SAN BERNARDINO • As arguments wrap up in the first jury trial in a far-reaching county corruption probe, a judge on Thursday dropped one of four felony counts against an executive staff member of former San Bernardino County Assessor Bill Postmus.

Defendant Rex Gutierrez, also a Rancho Cucamonga councilman, is accused of defrauding taxpayers by working on personal or Rancho Cucamonga matters on county time and falsifying time cards, during his service as intergovernmental relations officer under Postmus.

I spent a better part of two days this past week exploring Hinkley, California, trying to get a feel for the community and those who live there. It seems to be an area without definition and little has been written about it, which left me with a lot to learn.

Residents can meet with Assemblyman Brian Nestande from 10 a.m. to 11:30 a.m. Friday in Riverside. Nestande represents an area that includes Lake Elsinore, Murrieta, Temecula, Perris, Hemet and Riverside.

Riverside County is exploring whether it has the legal right to count more than 12,500 June 8 election ballots that arrived at the county election office after the legal deadline.

State law requires ballots be in the office of the county registrar of voters by 8 p.m. the day of the election. But, because of miscommunication between the county and the U.S. Postal Service, 12,563 ballots that were at a Moreno Valley post office June 8 were not picked up by elections officials until the following day.

The L.A. mayor’s practice of attending dozens of concerts, sports events and award shows without paying is under investigation by the city Ethics Commission and the D.A. He has argued that he attended the events free to perform official duties.

By David Zahniser, Los Angeles Times

June 25, 2010

Los Angeles Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa said Thursday he would release records Friday spelling out the official duties he performed at dozens of concerts, sports events and award shows that he attended free of charge.

The mayor’s practice of going to those events without paying is the subject of an investigation by the city’s Ethics Commission and an inquiry by Dist. Atty. Steve Cooley’s Public Integrity Division. Villaraigosa has argued repeatedly that tickets to such events do not need to be disclosed as gifts under state law because he was performing official or ceremonial duties.

Democrats are three votes short of cutting off debate on a bill that would reinstate long-term unemployment benefits and provide help to businesses and cash-strapped states, including California.

By Janet Hook and Noam N. Levey, Tribune Washington Bureau

June 25, 2010

Reporting on Washington —

Senate Republicans on Thursday once again blocked legislation to reinstate long-term unemployment benefits for people who have exhausted their aid, prolonging a stalemate that has left more than a million people without federal help.

With the Senate apparently paralyzed by partisan gridlock, the fate of the aid, as well as tax breaks for businesses and $16 billion in aid for cash-strapped states, remains unclear. California and dozens of other states are hoping for federal aid to help balance their budgets.

After saying earlier in the week that a 2007 incident with a female subordinate was a verbal clash, the Republican admits she ‘physically escorted’ the aide.

By Seema Mehta, Los Angeles Times

June 25, 2010

Republican gubernatorial nominee Meg Whitman admitted Thursday that a confrontation with a subordinate at EBay in 2007 became physical, contradicting her assertion earlier in the week that the incident was a “verbal dispute.”

The New York Times reported last week that in June 2007, a communications aide was helping to prepare Whitman, then EBay’s chief executive, for an interview with the Reuters news agency when Whitman got angry, uttered an expletive and shoved the aide. The incident led to a confidential settlement in which the employee, Young Mi Kim, reportedly received $200,000.